Historical & Cultural

In my essay I will discuss the topic of clothing and how it has become some what of a form of expression yet also a way to boast and show off. I will look at how modern day people use clothing to make themselves feel better, not only in the sense it makes them secure about themselves but also in the sense they buy certain designer clothes simply to be-little and show off to other humans. I will look at how designers influence the general publics choices on what to wear and whats on trend comparing them to the types of trends that were once about, such as when Greeks particularly liked to compete in sports naked to show off their body. I will compare designers such as Vivienne Westwood to the statues of the Hellenistic period. I will discuss how people are no longer comfortable in their own skin like they once was and how 'peacocking' is not a wide spread thing. I will do all of this by researching facts about the areas and adding my own points and opinions into the essay.

Concrete Sculptures: Take 2

After leaving my sculptures over the summer to be weathered and distorted from natural forces I really like the result that's been created. My small yellow sculpture in particular works the best, the weather has made it fade and I think this is successful in creating the natural essence I was aiming for. Though the other two haven't faded as much I still think it works well as they are now no longer all the same and it makes you question why they're like that. 

To take this idea of them being slightly different further I have decided to be really drastic and add to the smallest sculpture. Going back to Miro's automatic way of working and simple choice of colours I decided to pick a contrasting colour to the shades of yellow (in this case blue/red) and add sparingly and again leaving it outside for the weather to change and naturalise my sculptures. I believe this has made an improvement to the scene I have created because now they're a little exciting and intriguing to the eye.

Concrete Sculptures

Here I have used chicken wire to make a frame, and covered the frames in scrim and concrete in order to create durable sculptures that can survive in the outdoors. I have used the automatic way of creating art just like Joan Miro to make the forms natural and as unscripted as possible whilst still retaining the concept. I decided to do a series of sculptures at different sizes in order to create a minimal impact size wise but a large impact in the sense there is a few of them but. I also focused on the colours i used, using mainly block bright colours in order to make them stand out and again reinforce the impact factor.  I created the shapes mainly in the automatic style of Miro, drawing sketches using simple shapes straight out of my mind with no deep thought and then transferring the shapes and images into a 3D format and I ended up with these. 

The smallest of my three sculptures was designed to represent 'Petrified wood' but I think it could also be related to a lump of gold found within the ground too. I decided to do this one the smallest as it is one of the most rare to be found naturally. The sculpture is created mainly with a mixture of spheres and cones and I think the lumped effect it has created transfers well and adds some mystery to the piece, you're not truly sure what it is supposed to be. 

The next sculpture I created was influenced by 'Volcanic' rocks and I wanted the deep reds to stand out and make a strong impression on the viewer. I think this one stands out the most out of my three sculptures and I really like that fact. The texture is very rough and as natural as I could get it, I made sure I didn't smooth the surface perfectly to create this feeling so viewers would want to touch the sculptures and interact with them. Which being made of concrete they surely can, just like some of Joan Miro's work and also very like Franz West's work.

The final and largest of my three sculptures I designed to have the feel of a natural rock found in the sea, river or pond and weathered by water and rain. Creating a green/blue layered surface just like algae gathers on real rocks. Though this is the largest of my three sculptures I wanted to make it the most subtle. Whilst still using bright colours I tried to down the impact and blend and town to create these deep, mysterious tones. 

 I think they work well within the grass due to the fact they are to represent natural found rocks within the ground. I however chose to place my sculptures above the ground on the sort of bricked plinth to make them stand out and seem like they are part of an exhibition. Overall they have been rather successful, I believe.

Sculpture maquettes

Before beginning work on my sculptures in the style of Miro's automatic way of working I created different maquettes to see if they'd be successful or not. I first created automatic drawings that slightly resembled a mess on a piece of paper but it was from this i took elements and shapes in order to create the maquettes seen below. They have been created using chicken wire, scrim and just a simple one coat plaster. I layered the plaster and scrim on and left the surface quite rough on purpose as the idea of automatic drawing is to be very automatic and I didn't want to force the result too much. 

This red one seen above reminds me a lot of bones and fossils that have been laying in the ground over a long period of time. It's very chunky but also very subtle. It creates a strange sort of feeling not being sure what the subject is and the slight red patches could be seen as possible blood stains. So far its down to the audiences thoughts upon the matter. I think the shape and form has overall been really successful and the sculpture can be viewed from any angle and still be interesting. I want this to be a big theme through out my sculpture process.

I created another one, this time larger and taking the idea of bones forward. The large sphere could be seen as a skull and the cones that make a ridge on the side could be seen as the spinal cord. It becomes almost eery in the fact it could be a pile of bones from a human. I decided to use completely different tones and colours as to not make the image too literal in the bone sense. Doing this has let me down another path as my result has been very natural looking and almost like a boulder you'd come across in a landscape and not even notice it. I'd like to keep using the same automatic style but adding these natural colours and formats to my sculptures.